Westbank Shopping Centre up for sale

Primaris Retail REIT, which owns 29 shopping malls across the country, including Kelowna’s Orchard Park Shopping Centre, is selling the leasehold of the Westbank Shopping Centre, a parcel that includes all but the large Zellers and former Extra Foods stores on the site.

The portion for sale is listed at 73,910-square-feet, is 99 per cent leased and includes tenants such as White Spot, Wendy’s, TD Canada Trust, Starbucks, Landmark Cinemas, Tim Horton’s, Blockbuster Video, Lammle’s, Liquor Depot, The Source, Westbank Shoes and Wok Box. The site is described as an 8.6 acre, L-shaped parcel.

Neither Zellers nor the former Extra Foods building are included but are listed as “shadow” anchors. Extra Foods closed in November when the large nearby Real Canadian Superstore opened.

No asking price is listed in the sales brochure, put out by Vancouver realtor Avison Young. But it says the Bank of Montreal holds a $9.45 million mortgage on the centre. The current 10-year term is set expires in 2015. The outstanding balance of the mortgage is $8.3 million.

The net operating income for the centre in 2011 is estimated at $1.447 million.

The mall is located on Westbank First Nation land, at the corner of Highway 97 and Gosset Road, and the lease covering the land the mall is located on will expire in 2091, according Avison Young, which is handling the sale.

The mall was the first major retail development in the Westbank area when it was built in 1996. Since then, it has been expanded and there have been several other commercial retail developments built on nearby WFN land, including large Home Depot, Canadian Tire, Walmart and London Drugs and Staples stores, as well as several smaller stores, restaurants and services such as banks.